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Bogor Police rescue dozens of mentally ill homeless people
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Care for marginalized: Bogor Police traffic unit head Adj.Comr. Hasby Ristama (center) gives food and water on Feb. 24 to a mentally ill woman found in Bogor, West Java. (JP/Theresia Sufa)
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ozens of people with mental disorders were relocated to public care facilities during a recent operation conducted across Bogor regency, West Java, in order to prevent them from coming to harm or being mistreated, the Bogor Police have said.
Bogor Police traffic unit head Adj.Comr. Hasby Ristama said the police had rescued 90 people with mental disorders from the streets and taken them to care facilities in the last 10 days,
Hasby said the police involved the Bogor Social Affairs Agency and the Bogor Public Order Agency (Satpol PP) in their operations. Mentally ill women were handled by the police's women corps (Polwan).
He said the police also strove to identify the mentally ill people by using the multi-biometric identification system in hopes that they could be returned to their families.
“Our program for managing people with mental disorders aims to give a more dignified treatment to this group of people. Many people have lost their sense of humanity, mistreating or misusing [the mentally ill] as scapegoats instead of protecting them,” he said on Saturday.
He referred to the recent series of attacks against religious leaders across Indonesia, in which many perpetrators were reported to be people with mental disorders.
Bogor Police spokesperson Adj.Comr Ita Puspita Lena said the police had followed up seven reports on attacks against religious leaders that were said to have been committed by mentally ill people.
The reported incidents went viral on social media, triggering unrest in areas across Bogor, such as Babakan Madang, Cigudeg, Cileungsi, Kemang, Caringin and Ciawi, but were proven to be hoaxes, she said. (ebf)
